A Golden Book of Venice

r hitherto beauty had sufficed to him and he had never sought to burden his creations with questions of the soul; but now the sadness of the unattainable that was growing within him look

n the footsteps of the master, absorbed in their tasks; others, gold

Venetian group upon which Paolo worked when not occupied with his Madonna; and a favorite pupil, the young nobleman Marcantonio Giustiniani, was in attendance upon the master. The lovely girlish face, of a spiritual type r

, his pupil revealed his roughly executed head; "yet thou hast painted the soul! The heart hath done it, Signorino mio,

he young fellow, flushing hot

oved the boy. "But for the noble Senator, thy father-of the Council of the Ten-

antonio imploringly,

I can do naug

the nobles shall find t

hall be there, for

caressed it, here and there, with loving touches of his magic brush, while the youn

f the house of Beroviero-nay, not so beautiful as Marina-wedded with one of our noblest nam

fellow, who gazed at it in silent amazement. "Only the eyes have I not touched," the Veronese explained

length, in ecstasy; "none among us

ld give," the master answered, well pleased. "Yet it is thou wh

ibro d'Oro,'" the young pat

y, for he himself was not written in that noble chronicle. "My

caro maestro, for in them is

f the Law; and in that Sala dei Capi, where at this moment sits Giustinian Giustiniani-one of the chosen three of the Council of the Ten-my name is written largely with mine ow

that alternated with the lovable, genial, generous impulses of an artist soul, overwhelming in energy and great in friendship; yet jealous, to a d

*

e Senate and of the Council of the Ten, should present himself before the Avvocato del Comun to claim admiss

t yet ready for the duties it would bring, so much more did he incline to that measure of boyish freedom which had thus far been his, so unwilling was he to renounce his longing

ncy, stimulated by his culte for the beautiful, that he had plead with her to win his father's consent for an art life. Yet he had himself acquiesced in her quiet but inflexible showing of the futility of attempting such an overturning of Giustiniani traditions, though he still went with dangerous frequency to the studio of the Veronese, to which she had procured him entrance upon hi

endid Sala di Consiglio of his own face grown venerable, wearing the ermine and the ducal coronet, in token of that supremacy so dear to each Venetian heart, but jealously held by every noble o

of power that was so chafed in the curbing, that he was too young to be forced into such ruthless service; and he could not but acquie

manifested in any sign of undignified eagerness. No house in Venice had held this right for more generations; no house was princelier in its bearing, nor more superbly republican! No member of that Supreme Council was more esteemed than th

urses of those philosophical conferences which had become the fashion since the sittings of the famous Council of Trent, and which had been conducted in various convents by distinguished professors from Padua and Bologna, and e

ian, upheld by the traditions of that long line of ancestry and by the memory of many honorable offices most honorably discharged by numerous members of his house. Marcantonio, on the contrary, was handsome, winning, pleasure-loving-after an innocent fashion, which brought some sneers from his compeers, the gay "company of the hose;" but he thought life not made for pain, nor ugliness, nor hardness of any sort; he was bred to luxury, yet his intellectual inheritance made learning easy for him; he was many sided and vaci

till, with its dainty finish and piquant history, conferred distinction, it was said, among the literati, upon its youthful owner; this was no less a treasure than that first copy of "Le Cose Volgare di Messer Francesco Petrarca," most exquisitely printed in type modeled after the poet's own elegant handwriting, and the volume had been superintended by many learned heads,-awaited with impatience, as a

Re christianissimo." Here was also preserved that still more curious allegorical drama which had been given at the grand fête at the Ducal Palace in honor of this over-adulated monarch. It was natural that some of these literary curiosities, of which the visit of Henry III. had been prolific, should have remained in possession of the masters of the

would never have confessed it openly, that in these latter days of the Republic the ermine was not likely to be offered to one so stern and masterful as her husband; while she also knew, and the knowledge held its compensation, that Giustinian Giustiniani could not be spared from the Councils of his government. She knew her history well, and she realized that the days of the Michieli and Orseoli were over, and that the supreme honor was no longer for the strong but for the pliant; th

n the Canal Grande; and fathers, in the Senate, in moments of unbending, discussed the probability of the immediate rise of the young Giustinian upon his admission to the Cons

for Venetian belle-ship with a patience worthy of a better cause-her long locks, mysteriously treated, streaming over the broad brim of the great, crownless hat whi

the Lady Laura had confided to her son the ordering of a set of goblets of girasole for the banquet-a

he gondoliers, meanwhile, in their splendid liveries, held converse with other gondoliers in lazily drifting barks, with hatchments of other noble houses embroidered on their sleeves; and th

ltro!'-there is no other like it-which he, the favored gondolier, has been burnishing for the

ul motion called forth by proper Mocenigo pride-so pliant are these barks of Venice to the moods of the gondolier. "It is less beautiful-by the Holy Madonna of San Castello!-than the lantern of wrought iron wit

appropriating this recent glory of Venetian workmanship in its own family emblem, that there is no present need of distance between him and his rival, and re

this banquet is only the precursor. "For of course there will be a sposalizia! Santa Maria! there is no room on the Canal Grande for the gondolas that come to the palazzo-from every casa in the 'Libro d'Oro'-to win the favor of the do

he Giustiniani gives welcome to her guests-princely gondolas they are, with felzes of brocaded and embroidered stuffs, the framework inlaid with ivory and mother of pearl, with metal fittings curiously wrought, and al

tact with that slow procession of barges bringing produce from the island gardens of Mazzorbo, there are other barges laden with great, white wooden tubs of water from Fusina, fresh and very needful to these cities of the sea, and the dark hulks of barks curiously entangled with nets and mast

nd greatness of Venice issued; there is almost a show of stateliness in the aggravating slowness with which their heavily freighted barks proceed, serenely occupying the best of the narrow waterway. They are not envious of the hangers-on of those palaces of the nobles, these free fisherfolk of the islands; they have only haughty stares for the servile set of

ut the Bridge, with the Lions of St. Mark on archivolt and parapet-the invariable official signet of Venetian dominion-stretches between that simpler quarter and this, which holds t